


Whiteboard

by V6ilill



Series: Shooting star falls fast, falls far [8]
Category: The Outer Worlds (Video Game)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Anti-Hero, Asexual aromantic Captain, Autistic Captain (The Outer Worlds), Biased Narrator, Estonian Martin Callahan, Evil Plans, Exploring Obscure Companies, Family Issues, Friendship, Gen, Headcanon, Hephaestus the company, Hephaestus the planet, Moral Ambiguity, Post-Game(s), Psychological Torture, Rizzo's the corporation, SAM doesn't exist, Teamwork
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-19
Packaged: 2021-03-24 21:07:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30078333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/V6ilill/pseuds/V6ilill
Summary: After the rescue mission to Tartarus, the captain still has much to do, and many battles to fight - she and all of her former crew:Felix strives to become the rebel leader neither of his role models ever were;Parvati walks the tightrope between the goodness of her heart and necessary evil;Ellie wishes to shape Halcyon's future as Phineas's apprentice;ADA thinks to grow out of the shadow of both her captains;Martin only wants to do his job as negotiator and get paid, yet keeps landing in greater and greater danger;and the Captain is accosted by a phantom from her past, the very man she once called brother turned against her, and an agent of Rizzo's who will stop at nothing to destroy her and everything she's built.Note: chronologically final work in the series, spoilers for everything previous
Relationships: ADA & Female Captain (The Outer Worlds), ADA & Original Male Character, ADA & The Captain (The Outer Worlds), Ellie Fenhill & Original Characters, Ellie Fenhill & Phineas Welles, Felix Millstone & Original Characters, Grimm & Martin Callahan, Martin Callahan & Original Character(s), Martin Callahan & Parvati Holcomb, Original Female Character/Original Male Character, Parvati Holcomb/Junlei Tennyson, The Captain & Felix Millstone
Series: Shooting star falls fast, falls far [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1560577





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> So, since the new DLC will supposedly involve Rizzo's, I thought to start posting this, since everything I've written will probably get invalidated by new lore. I mean, I hope the company will get the attention it deserves, being perhaps the biggest threat to a rebel captain after UDL. But I honestly hate the game by this point.

Nathanael felt faint, darkness dancing across his sight. He was supposed to be- supposed to- he was awake? His cryostasis was over? Nathanael clenched his fists, and felt nothing. He wasn’t even sure he could move. Why wasn’t he seeing anything? Why couldn’t he see, he could definitely hear something above him, he had to-!

“Vitals stabilizing . . . mr. Blake, can you hear me?” a woman’s voice intoned somewhere to the left, followed by quiet, unintelligible gibberish.

Nathanael tried to pry open his eyes, to no avail. He couldn’t feel his limbs, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t- couldn’t-

His eyes flew open. He was looking up at a pastel ceiling, floaters flashing in his sight. No matter how much he blinked, they didn’t leave. Bright light was angled at him from several directions, painting the walls and ceiling an even starker pale violet. The Hope’s medbay didn’t look like this, or was he misremembering?

“Hey, you,” the woman called him, Nathanael turning his head with effort “You’re finally awake. You were expecting to be revived in ten years, right? But by now, it’s been more than seventy.”

“What?” he croaked out, eyes focusing on her labcoat “Seventy?”

“Yes, you have been in cryostasis for seventy years,” the scientist repeated “You are also the only subject here. The others have been seized by a rebel paramilitary and indoctrinated into their ranks.”

“What?!” Nathanael flinched as if burnt “Oh my God! What happened?!”

“I see that I should’ve been more graceful,” the woman sighed “Mr. Blake, calm yourself. Once I run a few tests, you will be released. Miss Newberry will explain everything. That name means nothing to you now, but she was the one that saved you from being brainwashed by the . . . dissidents.”

Nathanael lay back and thought of home. He had outlived all of his family. They were all dead. He would never write to his cousins about his new life on the frontier of space. He promised them. He promised them he would describe everything after both of them failed the entrance exam. He had promised them - and now they were dead.

“You’re in good condition, but avoid strong stimulants for the next two weeks,” the woman pronounced and stood by as Nathanael tried to stand.

A wave of nausea hit him and his vision blackened as the man adjusted to being upright. He blinked, his sight clearing, and found himself towering over the scientist. He smiled faintly to himself: at least he hadn’t shrunk in cryosleep like May had jokingly hoped he would.

Speaking of . . . what had happened to her? Was she a thrall of those rebels, or was she still in stasis? What if she was dead?!

Nathanael took a deep breath. It would do no good to worry about that now. He needed answers.

“Where is this Newberry woman?” Nathanael requested “Could you . . . could you bring me to her?”

“I’ll call her down,” the scientist sighed, fixing her safety gear. She activated a purple button near the door, and soon Nathanael hear footsteps.

“Hello there,” the young man waved “I was told you saved me from dissidents.”

“Indeed,” Violet nodded, giving him a hand to shake “They planned to reawaken you and use your skills and knowledge for their own ends. The rebels can be very persuasive, if need be, and experts at twisting the truth - if I had left you to them, you would now be serving their cause. I do not mean to imply you as weak-willed or gullible, however. Not all who serve their cause have the option to leave . . . if you catch my meaning.”

“Oh. That’s terrible. So, I’m Nathanael Blake, but I think you knew that already,” he continued “And you are . . .”

“Violet Newberry, employee of Rizzo’s,” she smiled “Let us proceed to my bunk, where I can explain certain things more thoroughly.”

Nathanael obediently walked after her. One glance from a window told him they were on a spaceship.

“Just hours before, I retrieved you from the Hope, taking the opportunity to sneak in while the rebels were away,” Violet broke the silence “Unfortunately, I could not save anyone else. I was told a Mrs. Anastasiya Kovalenko was a friend of yours.”

“We did know each other,” Nathanael nodded, a sinking feeling constricting his stomach.

“My condolences to you. She was killed by a rebel scientist many years ago, when he foolishly attempted to revive the colonists to bolster his cause,” she revealed. Nathanael froze in place.

“What about May?” he swallowed a lump in his throat “Her, uh, name is Chenda Keo and you-you wouldn’t happen to know anything about her?”

“Sit down, Nathanael,” Violet sternly moved a chair his way. The man collapsed into it. Dread ate away at his stomach.

“I am terribly sorry to say that your friend has become a dissident,” the woman took a seat opposing him “A leader of the rebellion, in fact. Now, you might think she is brainwashed. That she is not acting of her own desire. But, Nathanael, tell me, were she and Mrs. Kovalenko close?”

“Yes, Ann was like-like a mother to May, she said so herself. How could she betray me? She’s not the kind of person who would- would . . .”

“I am sorry, Nathanael. She has tricked you,” Violet took his hand “Captain May leads the rebellion, on the beck and call of the very man who killed Anastasiya Kovalenko and many other colonists. She would have made you work for her and her master, Phineas Welles. He professes to be a savior, but in truth his incompetence has killed hundreds. Now, with the aid of your former friend and the killing of many more innocents, he has stolen the secret to cryonic revival from us and is using it to tear down everything the companies have built.”

“Oh,” he looked at Violet’s dark hand on his paler one “She really . . . why would she do that?”

“She believes the words of her lord and master implicitly. She think she is making the world a better place,” the woman described “She cannot be reasoned with, and she cannot find redemption. Her crimes are too great - no moral person would ever wish to associate with her. 

She recruits criminals, hapless fools and desperate sods, dragging them down to her level. She lets whole companies fall into treason and sedition. She killed the Halcyon Holdings Board’s Chairman, and assassinated his Adjutant when she called the captain to parlay. She broke into UDL’s cryonics lab and stole the chemicals they were using, at the price of killing the thirty-three innocent volunteers being experimented upon. She showed no remorse, no pity, not even a moment of consideration - she didn’t even look her victims in the eye as they suffocated inside their cryotanks.”

Nathanael was shaking. A shudder ran through the very core of his being. May - doing that? He had loved her once. He still loved her. He had waited years to have her. He had come for Halcyon for her. And now she spat in the face of all that was good and right. Now, instead of being with him, she was gallivanting around the stars, playing hero. She worked with Ann’s murderer. Ann’s murderer. Yesterday, they were all together and looking towards a bright future. Now Nathanael woke up to rebels and ruins.

“No matter how painful it is for me to say it, hear me out: your friend, May, cannot be redeemed,” Violet took his other hand as well “It might seem to you like she could, like you could make her listen, but that is folly. I am telling you this, Nathanael, because I, unlike the rebels, refuse to twist the truth to my own ends, no matter how painful it might be. I believe you strong enough to handle this.”

“I . . . I’m not sure,” Nathanael sniffed.

“You will have time,” she reminded him gently “When you are ready . . . it pains me to ask this of you, but would you tell me what you know of May? I understand it is a great burden to place upon one’s shoulders, but you are quite capable.”

What reason did Violet even have for believing that? Nathanael had been so deeply blindsided by May, so convinced of her unassuming nature. Not even when she told him about . . . about . . . he’d thought it right at the time, but it must’ve been a portent. A portent that she would always do as she wanted, all else be damned. May had never grown out of her childishness. Once, it had seemed endearing, made her so loveable, so enrapturing and eyecatching.

Now, Nathanael put his head in his hands and wept. All his love had been for nothing.


	2. Captain May

The captain swung her feet over her bed, picking up a crutch as she went. She took a look at her helmet, and chose to leave it there. She had to get used to being in the open. Nobody could see her disfigured face anyway - nobody but ADA, and she saw worse things on the daily.

May sauntered into the bathroom, pulling herself up on the sink. She bent down, feeling her knees protest every decision she had made her entire life, and set the crutch against the shower stall.

The captain took a toothbrush and began the process of rhythmically jamming it up her mouth orifice. Her free hand went on autopilot, opening every drawer, searching even the laundry basket - all for nothing. She couldn’t have her inhalants. There weren’t any.

Ah, how she still longed for them all this time later. Never change, May. Never change.

“Good morning, May!” Felix swaggered into the bathroom, something vaguely resembling a shaving razor in hand “What’s up?”

May spat out both the toothbrush and the toothpaste.

“Sorry. I know how much you hate being seen like that,” he gestured vaguely at the mirror.

May stared at the shower stall. It needed cleaning. On second glance, an entirely new ecosystem had sprung up on the glass.

“We’ve almost reached the space station,” he declared “I’ll, uh, come back when you’re done. Prepare yourself for enacting the glorious revolution upon the nearby spacecraft!”

“But first, I’ve gotta enact glorious revolution on my hair,” May chuckled “It’s looking a bit too ordered, don’t you think?”

Then she realized her terrible mistake. “Wait no, don’t look!” she covered her head and once again lost the gift of speech.

“Of course I’m not looking, this is nothing I haven’t seen before,” Felix teased “Many times before, in fact. Especially when you weren’t looking.”

May thanked the universe for not giving her paranoia in addition to all her other issues.

“While your banter is certainly amusing, the space station looms ahead,” ADA announced “Captain, it shouldn’t be taking you so long to address your hygienic needs.”

May rolled her eyes and shuffled away to find her dear helmet. Ah, if only her ship came with a giant death lazer installed, then she wouldn’t need to find the station’s self-destruct button inside. Man, what genius had first decided that any respectable evil lair needed a self-destruct button, anyway? And now, because of everything being manufactured from a template, all space stations had the same basic layout and the same instant death button in the middle. 

How convenient for a variety of amateur revolutionaries.

The Unreliable closed in. Why it was allowed to dock, after getting in and out of Tartarus, remained unclear. Terra-2 floated placidly below, all deceptively green and beautiful.

“Your vehicle is not in the parking registry,” a corporate drone appeared on the screen as the ship attached to the docking apparatus “Please submit credentials.”

“Here are my credentials,” Felix reloaded his grenade rifle “You might want to leave while you still can.”

“Credentials invalid,” the woman continued in a monotone “Please present proper authorization.”

“See you in hell,” said Felix and terminated the connection. He stepped out of the ship, May trailing behind. She leaned heavily on her crutch, making her much slower and louder than she was used to. Not that she had ever known anything of subtlety.

A guard stopped them in the first intersection, but before he could so much as alert anyone, May had felled him with one shot from her pistol.

“I’ll defend the ship,” May laid out her plan “You try and sneak inside.” For some reason, she suspected that Felix wouldn’t follow her advice, and not from lack of trying.

The intercom blared with warnings, every camera anxiously awaiting the sight of rebel scum. Felix took off, dispatching another guard as he went. May shuffled closer to her ship, opening the blastproof door. To think that she’d forgotten about ADA!

“Can you hack the mainframe?” the captain leaned inside “I mean, they contacted you, for what it’s worth.”

“The reminder is appreciated,” the robot replied smoothly “However, my mind computes faster than yours, hence there is really no need to tell me of things I can easily figure out long before you.”

“Uh, okay then,” said May, again reminded of her (marked lack of) considerable intellect.

“Besides, the encryption will almost certainly take days to crack,” ADA continued in a pleasant tone “Hacking is a very long process.”

“Well shit,” the captain shrugged and crawled back out.

Just as the door closed behind her, the muzzle of a gun peeked out from behind a corner, a helmeted guard taking aim, one finger on the trigger, pulling down, the muzzle pointing right at May, right at her, right at-

The captain watched the bullet whiz past above her, its trajectory visible in slow-motion. The guard moved to readjust his aim, but time itself was acting against him. May pointed her pistol and aimed. Taking a life had never been this fast and easy.

The woman let out a slow breath and heaved herself up onto her crutch. Seeing that the landing area was right behind a corner, she maneouvered herself in front of it. No more would the meddlesome corner foil her dastardly plans! Now, her murder spree would truly begin!

The first to witness May’s true (unlimited!) power was another unlucky guard, just doing his job for the company that fed him and his family. As he charged down the hall, gun about to blaze, the captain laid him down with a well-aimed pistol shot. Her gun was very unremarkable and small, but a bullet to the head was a bullet to the head, no matter where it came from.

No more corporates seemed to desire to die that day, as the hallway remained empty.

“Caution,” the baritone voice of the space station’s AI announced “Self-destruction protocols have been engaged. Please remove anything valuable onto the evacuation pods within fourteen minutes and fifty-one seconds.”

So that was done. All May had to do now was wait for Felix and fly away into the sunset together. It was always sunset. The sun was always setting somewhere, you know.

More guards ran past, but none of the at May, the corporates disappearing from one hallway to the next. Guess they didn’t want to die at the hand of a mass murderer, instead trying their luck with the unforgiving void of space (for some reason, the captain suspected escape pods were in short supply on Board-run stations).

May leaned on the wall, waiting for Felix to arrive. He didn’t make her wait long, distant explosions and flying gibs heralding his return.

“How’d it go?” the captain called out, beginning the short, yet slow (stupid leg injury), trek to the ship.

“Good, since I’m not injured,” the man waved his gun to discourage the corporates behind them from following.

The two revolutionaries entered their ship, and ADA disengaged herself from the space station.

“I’ll go grab drinks,” said Felix, leaving May to stare out the illuminator at the orbital outpost further and further away. Funny how they were now celebrating the deaths of a few dozen people. Oh well. Wallowing in pain and misery over necessary sacrifices would get them nowhere.

Felix clambered down the stairs with a bottle of juice and two cups.

“Just in time for the fireworks,” ADA noted dryly.

And indeed, the space station exploded - much less brightly than in the movies, but it was still quite the lightshow. May watched tiny little escape pods float away, like burnt-out rockets falling out of the sky after a particularly cool pyrotechnics display. She took a sip of her juice - it was getting blander with every batch. What wonderful chemical additives were now being put in due to shortages of actual fruit? (silly of you to think that juice has ever contained any fruit!)

Another successful mission.

“Rizzo’s gunship approaching,” ADA cut through the haze of contentment “Seems the station had backup.”

“Not that the backup saved them,” May noted.

“Woah, it’s a gunship just like from the posters!” Felix exclaimed “. . . aaand it’s coming right towards us. But still, look at those turrets! The one on top can fire in every direction and-”

The topmost turret, could indeed fire in at least the forward direction. The Unreliable’s hull groaned as the ship narrowly dodged a fatal shot, the blow only grazing the top. The approaching vessel kept on firing, coloring the black sky in streaks of yellow and orange.

A particularly close impact threw both May and Felix to the floor, rattling the interior walls.

“Left thruster compromised,” ADA announced matter-of-factly “Prolonged chase inadvisable.”

“Can we land?” Felix pointed to Terra-2 below, holding onto a wall for safety.

“Most likely,” the robot answered “Though making it to Edgewater would be preferable.”

The gunship was so close May could make out its viewports and the lettering on its hull - the Luminosity, it read. How pretentious. One of the side turrets shot again, searing the captain’s eyes.

It was so close - point-blank range, surely! - she was already dead, wasn’t she? Any moment now she’d explode, and Felix too, and there wouldn’t be anything left to burn-

The shot echoed through the Unreliable, reverberating through the floor. May clenched her teeth together so they wouldn’t chatter.

“Right thruster compromised,” ADA noted “It seems the discovery of whether I can land cannot be postponed. Brace yourselves.”

“Yay,” May ground out.

“We should’ve installed more seats,” Felix realized, wincing in preparation for great unpleasantness.

“It’s all yours,” the captain pointed to the one present. “At least one of us should be able to walk out of that landing,” she elaborated “And my crutch is too small for you.”

“Good point,” he said and strapped himself in.

Another shot whizzed past the illuminator, dissipating into the void. The shape of the planet shifted sideways, rushing to meet the would-be revolutionaries with the crushing embrace of gravity, like a smiling company mascot who sold guns meeting a few dissidents.

The false-gravity of the spaceship stopped May from being plastered against the floor violently, but the loss of maneuverability from broken thrusters made itself felt by tilting the (crash)landing craft sideways, slamming it against the earth rear-end first.

Felix unfastened the multitude of seatbelts and offered May her crutch which had been thrown into the cargo bay’s closed doors. The captain stood, fixing her helmet. One of its lenses had broken, glass shards littering the floor.

“There is a need for urgent repairs,” ADA assessed the damage “Alas, if only the former First Mate was here.”

“I miss Parvati too,” said Felix, missing the ‘repairs needed’ talk completely.

“My reasoning isn’t entirely sentimental,” the robot replied pointedly.

“Oh,” understanding seemed to dawn on him.

“We’re fucked,” May noddded along.

“I especially,” ADA agreed

The landing ramp did not descend fully, remaining hanging awkwardly in midair. Felix deftly jumped off, May trailing behind him. On second glance, the ramp wasn’t hanging, rather, the ship itself was positioned oddly, its rear dug into the earth and tilted towards the side with the ramp. The landing edifice touched the soil with one end, while the other remained about an inch off.

May surveyed the landscape - rolling green hills, rotting red ruins and some intact-looking buildings in the distance, a large holographic sigil flashing over them.

“Kolway Pharma,” Felix broke the silence, peering at the display of wasted electricity “Well, at least we haven’t killed their Chairman yet.”

“How reassuring,” said May, shaking dust off her chafing boots.

Well, there was no way out but forward. So the two revolutionaries set off into the maze of abandoned and maintained buildings in search of salvage.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kolway Pharmaceuticals is another big company that literally nothing is known about, aside from the fact that it is the parent of Auntie Cleo's. Shame how the Board is always presented as this one monolith of evil and cruelty, when it's a coalition

**Author's Note:**

> I know I won't be updating this quickly, I have three more fics I'm concurrently writing. But comments would greatly motivate me.


End file.
